Unique: Graf #4

         I still have all of my original baby blankets except for one. When I was little I carried my favorite blanket around with me. It had tons of holes in it and had a small hard circle on it from some drink that I spilt on it that never came out. I called it blankie and one day left it at a store and never saw it again. I was so devestated that my Nana, who made the original blankie, knit me a new one, holes and all. I still have it and bring it with me whenever I go on long trips away from home. I still have the very first Beanie Baby I ever bought as well. The name on the tag was Rufus, but I couldn't pronounce it so I named him Ruffles. I brought him everywhere with me, one day I dropped him out of my bag in the snow at school and couldn't find him. My mom had bought another Rufus as a back up, but it didn't compare. Ruffles had matted hair and was faded and meant the world to me. One day when my mom dropped me off at school she saw ruffles by the side of the road, it was a miracle, he was intact and fine, just soggy and dirty. She took him home, washed him, and had him waiting for me when I came home that day. A few years later I was looking for him in the morning while I was getting ready for school and found him underneath the futon, limbs torn off and beads everywhere. I screamed as though someone was stabbing me with a rusty knife and scooped him up then ran into the bathroom where my mom was taking a shower. She sent me to school and somehow managed to get every bead she could find back into him and sew his limbs back on. One of his legs now splits off to the side, and and ear flops freely away from his head because the stitch that had kept it attached to the head in a second spot was ripped. I think that most people would have thrown these things away, not have stayed attached to them like me because they were different from the original. I don't think I'll ever be able to throw blankie and ruffles away, they've become more than just objects from my childhood, they are parts of me. I'm unique because I don't grow attached to pictures, for me they don't hold enough of the memory. I get attached to objects because when I hold it or touch it, I can  remember every time I've ever had with or around it. It's more than just, oh this was a blanket that my Nana knit me to replace one I lost, or oh this is just a nasty old beanie baby that I bought with my own money. It's this is a blanket that reminds me of one I had from when I was a baby to when I was about 5, it brings back memories from before I got it, to after, and it shows how much I mean to my Nana when she was willing to knit me a whole new blanket, same colors, same holes, same everything but the hard cirlce stain. This is a cute yet deformed beanie baby that I named with a name from my head, it was the very first thing I ever bought with my own money. It helped me get though my fear of the dark and my fear of school. Theses are things that I love like they are family members, things that I always have to know where they are. I will never give them away, not even to my own kids.